Construction Budgeting Resource for Arizona December 8, 2011
Posted by carolhagen in budgeting, Construction Industry - Cash Flow Forecasting.Tags: budgeting, construction, hr, Payroll, salary
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Construction company budgets are heavily weighted to the salary and compensation plans of their employees. Whether it’s the chief estimator, accountant or IT director, knowing what the going rates are in your area can help you budget and ultimately attract the best talent to your construction firm. Here in Arizona, the Valley of the Sun Chapter of the Construction Financial Management Association (CFMA) is conducting an on-line Construction industry salary survey. You can get this resource for free just by participating.
Take the AZ Construction Salary Survey on-line: https://novisurvey.net/n/7g2.aspx
Many of the regional associations have been invited to participate including:
The results will be broken down by company demographics: number of employees and type of contractor so you can make meaningful comparisons. There are questions on economic indicators, employee development, employee benefits and employee compensation.
View the questions before taking the survey: 2011 AZ Construction Salary Survey
All contractors (GCs, highway/heavy and trades) doing business in the state are welcome to participate. Every firm that completes the survey will receive a copy of the results for free in early 2012. Everyone else will have to pay $100. Deadline is December 15, 2011. Start the survey now on-line: https://novisurvey.net/n/7g2.aspx
Copies can be purchased on-line. For more information visit http://cafe.cfma.org/valleyofthesun/home/
Please share this with others in the industry as the more contractors who participate, the more valuable this construction resource will be.
Contractors in Arizona, the New Sales Tax and Your Bottom Line May 21, 2010
Posted by carolhagen in budgeting, construction accounting software, Construction Industry - Software, Construction Industry Hardware, Document Imaging.Tags: budgeting, construction, salestax, technology
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Arizona Contractors In a Pickle?
In yesterday’s election the voters of the State of Arizona overwhelmingly approved a temporary 1% increase in the sales tax rate. The higher rate goes into effect June 1st, 2010.
The ABA successfully lobbied a protection from increases such as this into state law several years ago. That statute reads:
ARS 42-5010 H. Any increase in the rate of tax that is imposed by this chapter and that is enacted by the legislature or by a vote of the people does not apply with respect to contracts entered into by prime contractors or pursuant to written bids made by prime contractors on or before the effective date of the legislation or the date of the election enacting the increase. To qualify for the exemption under this subsection, the prime contractor must maintain sufficient documentation, in a manner and form prescribed by the department, to verify the date of the contract or written bid.
Projects that are bid or contracted to prior May 18th are exempt from the sales tax increase.
What Impacts Your Bottom Line?
The sales tax increase ups the owner’s cost of building at a time where many contractors are still struggling to survive. As a construction company you will continue to keep your construction office overhead low. Recently I shared some ideas with ConstrucTech Magazine’s readers on what I’ve seen contractors do…some good ideas and a few things to avoid as it relates to computer systems and technology spending. Here’s a link to the May 2010 article “Technology Budgets in a Pickle”.
I’d love to hear what you’ve successfully implemented (click the comment option at the top of the blog) and feel free to share this with the construction industry as we all can use a little help.
Construction Salary Survey January 11, 2010
Posted by carolhagen in budgeting, Construction Industry - Software.Tags: construction, salary, survey
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The Construction Financial Management Association (CFMA) Valley of the Sun Chapter in Phoenix AZ has compiled the 2009 comprehensive salary survey as a resource for the construction industry. With commercial, industrial and residential participation from general contractors, highway heavy and specialty trades, the survey addresses office, field and executive compensation and has added specific questions about the economy to help contractors see what the industry is doing with staff, wages and compensation. Here’s a sample of the report to wet your appetite:
The survey will be available for purchase for non-participating firms online January 15, 2010 at http://chapters.cfma.org/ValleyOfTheSun/publications.html and the table of contents can also be viewed there. The survey was open to all contractors, calls for participation were conducted with the help of numerous construction associations in the state of Arizona and the survey data was collected during November and early December 2009.
Thank you to the many associations and their members who participated in the survey for recognizing the value you add to the community. I was humbled by the expertise of my fellow survey committee volunteers and their dedication to the industry.
- Rayleen Colletti, CPA Chair – Hunter Hagan & Company LTD
- Dave Goris – D. P. Electric Inc.
- Moni Lalonde – Lovitt & Touche’
- Gina Nelson – Hire Resolutions/Hire Impression
- Phil Taylor, CPA – Taylor, Duffy & Associates
A special thanks goes to PerfectForms and their employees who automated the data collection and made our efforts paperless and green.
I’d be interested in knowing if any other construction salary surveys have been conducted recently and if their numbers are congruent with the Arizona survey. Please let me know if you run across other resources (local, regional or national) in the comments and share the links liberally.
Where Does Your IT Budget Go? September 16, 2009
Posted by carolhagen in budgeting, Construction Industry - Software, Construction Industry Hardware.Tags: budgeting, construction, technology
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According to an MIT Sloan Center for Information Systems Research Study, the average firm spends 71% of their IT budget on running current systems and some blow as much as 80% of their budget keeping the status quo. What if you could reduce this to 50-60% of the IT budget?
That’s what can be achieved over time according to “IT Savvy” by Peter Weill & Jeanne W. Ross. Being obsessed with Fixing What’s Broken, Building a Digitized Platform and Exploiting the Platform for Profitable Growth is how they describe the IT Savvy firm. Within the book, they outline the journey of becoming IT savvy as having four stages: Localizing, Standardizing, Optimizing and Reusing.
While only 2% surveyed have attained the Reusing stage, these firms enjoy a 20 % higher profit than their competitors and have an average IT budget that is 145% higher than the localized stage IT department. What makes the Reusing stage distinct is that they continuously improve, are business agile and introduce product innovations. They use IT strategically. To tell where you are in the process, you’ll want to benchmark unit costs and compare yourself to competitors. The appendix of IT Savvy has a questionnaire to also help determine your current stage. For construction firms metrics you may want to purchase CFMA’s Information Technology Survey, or peek at Intel’s performance measurements in their Information Technology 2008 Performance Report.
You may also want to read a recent global CIO study which states that “half of CIOs are expecting to implement completely standardized, low-cost business processes [over the next five years]”. Their visionary plans include business intelligence & analytics, virtualization, risk management & compliance, and business process management. The CIO pragmatist enables corporate vision, makes working together easy and concentrates on core competencies. This all happens while 14% of the CIOs time is looking for ways to cut costs. Where do you spend your money & your time?
Carol's Construction Technology Blog 